


Polaris

by beans_on_toast



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Excessive Celestial Metaphors, M/M, Outer Space, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Yusuf al-Kaysani likes stars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-30
Updated: 2021-01-30
Packaged: 2021-03-17 00:40:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29091429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beans_on_toast/pseuds/beans_on_toast
Summary: Yusuf loved the stars. When he was a young boy, his father taught him their names and filled his mind with stories. He learned to navigate by them, on ships and over land. He would lay underneath them, staring into the heavens, small and insignificant, one man among many.Joe spends his first thousand years under the same,familiar stars. He spends his next thousand years learning new ones.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 11
Kudos: 21
Collections: All and More (18+) Kaysanova Gift Bag 2020





	Polaris

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MidnightGardener](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MidnightGardener/gifts).
  * In response to a prompt by [MidnightGardener](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MidnightGardener/pseuds/MidnightGardener) in the [All_and_More_Gift_Bag_2020](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/All_and_More_Gift_Bag_2020) collection. 



> I hope you like this! I love the idea of them one day getting to space and I couldn't think of anything more difficult to overcome than be seperated by the vastness of space!
> 
> **Prompt:**
> 
> 1\. DISCORD: HeyBrewtiful  
> 2\. SHORT PROMPTS: Rescues, behind enemy lines, trauma  
> 3\. LONG PROMPT: Joe and Nicky are forced apart for some reason, and are driven to find each other again no matter the cost  
> 4\. DON'T WANTS: PWP, animal cruelty/death, college au, kid fic, anything too cutesy

Yusuf loved the stars. When he was a young boy, his father taught him their names and filled his mind with stories. He learned to navigate by them, on ships and over land. He would lay underneath them, staring into the heavens, small and insignificant, one man among many. When the press of time and distance grew heavy on his heart, he could look up and remember his mother, father, sisters lay under the same stars. No matter how many miles stretched between them, they were connected under the same heavens.

When he died the first time, he died under endless stars.

*****

On the long trek through the desert, as the years blurred together, Yusuf shared the stories of the stars to his unexpected companion. Their hands brushed against the night sky as they leaned together and he taught Nicolò to find his way home.

Nicolò, it seemed, had his own destination in mind, and the one night that never faded from Yusuf’s memory, the stars twinkled above them as Yusuf finally tasted Nicolò’s lips.

In that moment, though he did not yet know it, Yusuf became infinite.

*****

Nicolò became Nicolas and still, Yusuf (now Josef) took comfort from the stars. The war to end all wars dragged on in the frozen, muddy fields of Europe. And their skills were better served apart. Josef slept fitfully, too cold. His arms reached for a body he had laid beside for eight centuries. He took some comfort, what little was to be had, knowing that Nicolas would see the same stars even if his heart did not lay next to him. 

The night he finally, _finally_ , had his love beneath him again, Josef traced the constellation of freckles over Nicolas' shoulders and remembered all the stories in them. 

*****

When the end came, humanity reached out to the stars. And by some unknowable fate, two men who died in the shadow of Jerusalem’s wall in 1099 joined them. Nile laughed at their faces, wide and awe-filled and Nicky tangled their hands together as Joe left behind the only planet he had ever known. 

The only planet he ever expected to know. 

Joe learned the names of as many of the new stars as he could. He stood next to Nile and pointed out the planets and systems, marking them out in his mind as he had years ago. Sometimes, when he laid in bed with his love, Joe would make up stories for the stars, whispering them in Nicky’s ear.

Even lifetimes away from those quiet desert nights, they were together always under the same stars.

*****

Joe did not know these stars. He watched them, twinkling beyond the window and could not name them. He tried. He drew them together with his fingertips and gave them names and stories. He imagined, as his vision grew dark and his breath laboured, that he was in the deserts of his home. 

When he woke again, gasping and frozen, the stars had changed again. Or he had forgotten. He named them again and again. His breath fogged up the glass. His hands shook. Death came faster, again and again. 

He was lost. He dreamt of Quỳnh, lost under the sea. Lost for five hundred years. But the sea was finite, contained on one small planet in one small corner of the galaxy. 

How many years would he drift, lost and forgotten with no way home? 

*****

The stars changed again; too bright, too close. He saw them behind his closed eyelids. Not stars. Lights and sounds. So much after the emptiness of space. The press of skin against skin. The familiar scent of _home._

‘How far did I go?’ he asked, his eyes still closed. ‘How far was my heart?’

‘Almost too far,’ Nicky said quietly. Nicky chaffed Joe's fingers, cold and numb, against his own. Joe did not pull away. How long had he gone without Nicky's touch? 

‘I am sorry it took us so long, hayati.’ Nicky pressed a kiss against Joe's forehead and it burned. He had forgotten warmth.

‘How did you find me?’ Joe asked, his voice rough and cracked. He could still see the unnamed stars. 'I had gone so far, beyond the maps. There was nothing to guide you.'

'I will always find you, Yusuf. _You_ are my guide, my sun.'

For so many years, centuries, _a millenia_ , Yusuf could look to the stars and name them. He trusted them to guide him home. Perhaps, _perhaps_ , when he made the heavens his home, with endless unknown stars, he needed a new guiding light.

'Ya amar,' Joe whispered. Their lips touched. 

And they were endless.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to Avanie for doing a beta and cheering me up!


End file.
